Anybody Home?
by nightpheonix
Summary: Sheppard wakes up one morning to find the whole crew of Atlantis gone, except McKay. BACK WITH A VENGEANCE!
1. The Lights are On, but

Anybody Home?

Disclaimer: I don't own Atlantis, Sci-Fi channel , MGM/UA and a whole bunch of other people do. Ha! You thought my disclaimer would be filled with glib sarcasm, didn't you?

A/N: I actually got this idea when I was thinking how cool it would be to slide around the halls of Atlantis in my socks. On with the story.

* * *

_Gooood morning, Atlantis,_ thought Major John Sheppard. _And what a bee-utiful morning it is._

Sheppard picked up his watch from the bedside table. 0453. Earlier than he usually got up He jammed his feet into his boots and began preparing for the day.

_Not like its ever NOT a beautiful day here, of course_, he continued. _Except when its hurricaning._

John looked around the room, checking to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything. His eyes fell briefly on his copy of War and Peace. He considered reading a paragraph or two before heading off to the mess hall, then thought better of it. It was too early for big words, anyway.

_Maybe I'll walk to the mess hall instead of taking the transporter. After all, it isn't too far, and I have plenty of time._

He began to stroll leisurely down the quiet hall, humming as he went. He didn't know why, but he felt like it was going to be a good day. Barring Wraith attacks, flooding, quarantine, and McKay's incessant nitpicking and complaining, of course.

The Major let his mind wander for a few minutes as he walked. It wasn't too long before his optimistic view of the day ahead had been replaced by a disquieting feeling. Something wasn't right.

_It's so quiet, _he realized suddenly. No footsteps, no talking, no _whoosh_ as the transporter doors opened. Nothing

_Have I even seen someone today?_ This thought struck John hard. He strained his memory, trying to remember if he had passed or spoken to anyone. Normally he would have encountered someone by now. Said 'hi' to Tayla in the hall, passed Ford on the way out of his room. Today, no one.

_I'm just up earlier than usual, that's all_. He glanced at his watch. It now read 0527. Not that early. By all accounts the military personnel should have been up now.

_Don't panic. After all, Atlantis is a big city, Maybe everyone's in the mess hall already. Or maybe Dr. Weir called an emergency and told everyone to stay in their rooms. And I didn't hear it. Yeah…_

Sheppard had broken out into a jog now. He looked through every open door (though there weren't many), hoping to catch a glimpse of someone. Anyone. He remembered reading The Shining by Stephen King as a teenager. It had frankly scared the crap out of him. He was reminded of how for weeks afterward he had had nightmares of running through the Overlook Hotel's vast and endless twisting hallways. He felt like he was in one of those nightmares right now. He wouldn't have been surprised if Jack Torrence had jumped out right then, brandishing a croquet mallet.

_C'mon, Sheppard, Pull yourself together!_ He attempted to reason. He was in a full sprint now, desperate to find anybody. He would even be glad to hear McKay's constant whining.

He stopped dead in the middle of the hallway, turned around, and screamed at the top of his lungs, "WHERE THE HELL IS EVERYBODY!"


	2. Okay, SOMEbody's home

2. Okay, SOMEBODY'S home

-_BODY, body, _body, the echo answered. But that was the only answer Sheppard got.

_I'll try and raise them on the radio_, he reasoned. He reached for the walkie-talkie on his belt, but it wasn't there.

"Goddammit!" he swore loudly. Now he had to go all the way back to his room to get the radio, He would have used the transporter, but he was afraid he would miss someone walking in the halls. He began to run the way he came.

_The tracking device. Don't forget the tracking device!_ He remembered. That could help him locate someone. Providing there was someone to locate.

_Maybe the Wraith kidnapped them all. Maybe the nanobot virus killed everyone in their sleep. No, but then anyone with the ancient gene would still be here._

The Major got so wrapped in these insane thoughts that he was hardly watching where he was running. He didn't notice one of the doors open ahead of him, and he bowled straight into a groggy Rodney McKay.

"Jesus, Sheppard! Watch where you're going!" McKay snapped as he got up and dusted himself off.

Sheppard's face lit up. "Rodney! You have no idea how happy I am to see you!"

McKay paused and gave Sheppard a strange look. "We see each other every day. Why would today be any different?"

"Well, y'see-" John paused. It sounded so stupid when he said it.

Now McKay was giving him an even stranger look. "Yeeesss…"

"I thought I was the only one left in Atlantis," he muttered as he turned red.

McKay let out a giant snort and asked, "You WHAT?" with a mixture of amusement and incredulity.

"Well, look around! No one's here!" Sheppard threw his arms up and looked around demonstrating the emptiness.

This remark earned a nonchalant shrug from Rodney. "So? They're all up already. Probably eating breakfast."

The major frowned. "McKay, on an average morning, when have you ever seen the halls this empty?"

_'Average morning?' There's no such thing as a 'average morning' in Atlantis,_ McKay thought. _But still…_ "Well, not really," he admitted. "But that doesn't prove a thing. You're overreacting, John." But McKay wasn't so sure. Sheppard wasn't exactly high-strung or excitable, and he was pretty worked up over this. "Look, if it makes you feel better, I'll go get my radio and you'll see that everyone is _fine_."

"Great. Just let me get my radio and the tracking device from my room." Sheppard dashed off.

_Maybe Rodney's right, _Sheppard reasoned with himself. _I'm probably just jumping to conclusions. I mean, everyone in Atlantis gone except me and McKay? _Sheppard tried to laugh it off but he couldn't shake his feeling of disquiet. _Everyone's here and they're all okay_ he thought firmly. But he really didn't believe it.

Rodney sighed. _Paranoid military types_, he thought as he rummaged through his room looking for his walkie-talkie. He knew John Sheppard was far from a paranoid military officer, but he was sure acting like it now. He found the radio among a Pile of notepads and went out to the hall to wait for Sheppard.

_I'll raise someone on the radio. Prove him wrong,_ he thought.

"This is McKay, does anybody copy?" he spoke into the radio. No response. He waited for a second and then tried again. _Funny…_

"Anything?" Sheppard asked as he came up from behind.

"No, but I only tried twice."

John turned on his radio and tried to hail someone, but to no avail.

"Believe me now?" Sheppard asked, starting to feel the strains of panic aclinging at him again.

"No… it still doesn't mean anything." McKay said uneasily. Granted, it was strange that no one was in the halls and the radio hails went unanswered, but that didn't prove that they were the only ones in Atlantis. "Let's check the mess hall. Someone's always in the mess hall. And that will convince you that we're all here. Besides, I'm hungry."


	3. Stupid SpaceTime Continuum

Chapter 3: Stupid Space-Time Continuum…

It was a rare sight.

A VERY rare sight.

Hell, an _impossible_ sight.

Impossible, unless everyone was gone.

The mess hall was completely empty.

"How…how could this happen?" Rodney stammered. "I mean, a few hundred people don't just up and disappear."

A grim Sheppard replied, "I don't know, but it looks like that's what happened."

"I can see that! We're the _only_ ones left in the whole city?"

Sheppard stared at the tracker's screen. Two dots. Him and McKay. That was it. "Looks that way."

"Why us?"

"Good question."

"That's not what I meant. Well, I mean, I feel that way but I didn't mean it that way."

"I know, Rodney."

"Well, what could possibly have happened that made everyone disappear except us?"

"I dunno. Gimmie a theory."

McKay turned to the major. "What?"

"You're the science man. Run something by me."

McKay thought. "Well, we could be stuck in a rip in the space-time continuum and-"

Sheppard raised an eyebrow. "A rip in the space-time continuum?" he asked skeptically.

"Hey, you're the one who asked me to come up with a theory!" Rodney said defensively.

"A realistic one!" John rebutted.

"Well, do you think that the Wraith came in the middle of the night and swept everyone but us away?"

"It's a helluva lot more likely than being sucked into a rip in the space-time continuum!"

"Oh, please," Rodney scoffed. "If the Wraith kidnapped everyone, do you seriously think they'd leave you behind? You're number one on their hit list!"

Sheppard paused. That honestly hadn't occurred to him. "Okay…where would you be on that list?"

"Well, Dr. Weir would be second, so I'd be fourth. Or third. Neh, fourth."

"Okay. Give me another theory."

"No! Come up with you own theory! I refuse to have mine dissected and picked apart, by someone who knows next to nothing about science, nonetheless!"

Ignoring the obvious insult, Sheppard stubbornly said, "Fine then. The nanobot virus got out and killed everyone except us because we have the Ancient gene."

McKay shook his head. "Three major problems with that, John. One: the city would have put itself into lockdown. Two: there would be more people around because we're not the only ones with the gene. And three: no bodies. Not to mention…"

"Now who's picking apart theories?"

McKay turned his back an ignored Sheppard.

After a few seconds of the silent treatment, Sheppard sighed and realized they were getting no where. "Alright, Rodney. I'm sorry for being skeptical about your theory." No answer. "Ignoring me isn't going to help find anyone else." Still no response. "Okay. Tell me more about the space-time continuum…thing."

At this, McKay brightened up. "Well, I read a book once where a whole bunch of people on an airplane flew through a time rip and only the people who were asleep got sucked into it…"

"'The Langoliers' by Stephen King."

Rodney looked up, surprised. "You read it too?"

"Nah, saw the movie. Didn't get it very well. Go on."

"Right…it would be really easy to prove, if Mr. King has done his research correctly."

"I'm listening…"

"All we'd need is a book of matches or a carbonated drink."

The two of them searched the mess for a carbonated beverage, because, as Sheppard so eloquently put it, "The Ancients built Atlantis, but I highly doubt they printed matchbooks." After a few minutes, John came up with a bottle of tonic water.

"Alright. I assume you know how this is going to work…" McKay began.

"Refresh my memory. It's been a while since I saw the movie, and I didn't understand it."

"Like I said earlier, the passengers of the plane flew through a temporal rip. If you remember, or if this was even in the movie, when they land and enter the airport, everything seems flat and two-dimensional because they have distorted space-time."

"English, Rodney. Speak English."

"They are no longer part of the continuum. They have essentially fallen out of time."

"Ah."

"So, if the same thing has happened to us, when we open this bottle, it will be flat with no bubbles." Rodney twisted off the cap. The bottle let out a fizzle and the carbonated bubbles floated to the top. He frowned. "So much for that idea."

"Well, maybe everyone else…er, fell out of time," Sheppard suggested.

"I don't think there's any way to prove that. Let's think of something else."

"Well, other than the fact that we both have the Ancient gene, why would we be the only ones left?"

"That's what I was saying earlier!" McKay sputtered.

"I know, Rodney. Calm down. It was rhetorical anyway. Look, just in case everyone with the Ancient gene is still in Atlantis, why don't you go see if you can find Beckett? I'll go to the gate room to see if anyone's there."

"But John-"

"_Go_, Rodney."


	4. McKay has a point there

A/N: I know you're all eager to find out where everyone went, but I swear I'll only beat around the bush for a little longer…

* * *

Chapter 4: McKay has a point there…

"Sheppard?"

Sigh. "What, Rodney?"

"I don't suppose you'd know where Beckett's room is?"

"No, I don't."

"Then how am I-"

"I don't know, McKay. Knock on all the doors or something."

"Knock on ALL the DOORS! Sheppard, I don't think you kn-"

John turned the radio off. Stupid idea, he knew, but he wasn't sure if he could take one more second of McKay's griping.

No one was in the control room. Not like he had expected anyone to be, but he just wanted to be sure. Plus, it got McKay off his back for the time being.

The major had the radar up on screen. One white dot moving. It didn't look like Beckett or anyone else with the Ancient gene was in the city. No harm in checking, though.

_Now, where could everybody have gone?_ John's initial panic and worry about his friends had been temporarily replaced by a general curiosity. He was still concerned, but for the moment he just couldn't worry anymore. There were no immediate signs of kidnap or plague. Well, there wasn't much of anything. It's not like everyone just got up and walked away.

"Hmm…" he said.

-

"—must be over 50 quarters in this section alone! You don't seriously expect me to search every one of them! Are you listening to me?" McKay momentarily stopped his barrage to hear Sheppard's reaction. "You turned off your radio, didn't you?" Pause. "Fine. Be that way."

McKay walked up to the nearest door, knocked on it, shouted, "Hello? Beckett? Anybody in there?" When there was no response, he walked up to the next door and repeated the procedure.

"…expecting me to check them all. Stupid military types always think they can order everyone around. Let's see him try and get all the doors…" streamed a constant muttering under McKay's breath.

About 5 minutes and 10 doors later, Sheppard came in on the radio. "McKay, you can stop knocking o doors now."

"Finally! You turned your radio off! How can you expect me-"

"I get it. You don't have to check doors, McKay. Just look for Beckett in the infirmary and meet me back in the gate room."

"Oh? And where will you be?"

"I'm looking in the jumper bay."

"Is that all you can think of in a time like this? If your precious puddlejumper is okay? You really need to straighten out you priorities!" Pause. "You're ignoring me again, aren't you?"

-

_Yes,_ though Sheppard as he gleefully shut his radio off. _I am ignoring you._

It wasn't as stupid as McKay made it sound. If the rest of Atlantis had left, they'd have taken the puddlejumpers.

_Okay, maybe it is stupid. The crew would take hours to shuttle out using all the jumpers. Besides, if everyone was to leave, they'd take the gate, not the jumper. And Weir would alert me before anyone left. But I'm willing to check anything now._

When he arrived in the jumper bay, it only took a second to count the jumpers. They were all there. No one escaped using the ships, anyway.

_McKay must have reached the infirmary by now._ Sheppard turned his radio back on. "Rodney?"

"There you are. Beckett's not here. Are the puddlejumpers okay?" he asked sarcastically.

"All of them are here. I'm going to fly an orbit around the planet to see if anything is out of the ordinary."

"Knock yourself out. What am I supposed to do in the meantime?"

"I dunno. Knock on doors."

"Ha ha. Very funny."

_-_

Ten minutes later, Sheppard returned to find McKay sitting on the top step of the stairs leading into the gate room.

"Find anything?" he asked blandly.

"No ships, no storms, no black holes, nothing remotely strange and nothing that could possibly explain this. Do you have any more ideas?"

"Nothing that could explain why Atlantis is empty. For once, I am at a loss for ideas," he glumly admitted.

"What? The legendary Rodney McKay out of ideas? The horror!" Sheppard mocked. Rodney glared up at him for a few seconds. The attempted humor evidentially hadn't worked. "You really have nothing?" McKay nodded, not making eye contact. Sheppard sat down on the third step.

"Just a strange and random thought," McKay stated suddenly.

"Sheppard turned around, interested. "Oh?"

"Now that no one's here, we can do whatever we want."

"You're right. That is random."

After a few seconds of silence, McKay stood up and asked "You know what I've always wanted to do?"


	5. Gateboarding and Bungee Puddle jumping

A/N: Wheee! Plot digression time! This chapter is basically what I wrote this fic for. I know you're all dying to find out why everyone is gone. I'm sorry it's taking so long to get to the point. One of my next chapters will be almost all techno jargon, and that takes a while to write. So bear with me and I promise you'll find out why in the next 2 chapters.

* * *

Chapter 5: Gateboarding and Bungee (puddle) jumping

"You brought a SKATEBOARD to ATLANTIS!" Sheppard yelled, flabbergasted. Then, on the heels of that, "You know HOW to SKATEBOARD!"

"I didn't bring it to skateboard with; I brought it because it is an extremely useful tool for carting stuff around and making repairs under things. And yes, I learned in college." McKay said calmly, putting the finishing touches on the makeshift ramp. He had laid down a huge piece of metal—_Lord knows where he found it_, thought Sheppard— down the stairs with supports in the middle and another piece of metal going up the ramp to the gate.

"And this is what you've always wanted to do—to do a skateboard jump through the stargate," the Major asked incredulously.

"In a manner of speaking, yes. Not necessarily through the stargate, but I've always wanted to board through a ring or hoop."

Sheppard shook his head. "You never cease to amaze me, Rodney."

McKay straightened up. "Well, I am a man of many talents," he said proudly.

"That's not what I'm talking about."

Rodney scowled. "Look, just go and watch from the control room, or something." He waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the control room. Sheppard, fearing for his life, happily obliged. Being on the same _planet_ as McKay with a skateboard was dangerous enough.

Sheppard watched from the control room with mixed horror and amusement. It would've been so damn _funny_ to watch if he hadn't been concerned McKay was going to kill himself.

Rodney strapped on a military helmet, complete with night vision goggles, the works. This made the major wince. If President Hayes knew how the expensive military equipment was being treated right now…

McKay got on the skateboard and began rolling down the "ramp." Sheppard half considered dialing a gate address quickly, or putting up the shield, but decided against it. The last thing he needed was for Rodney to be sent to another planet or killed, leaving him in Atlantis alone.

Now McKay was going up the other end of the ramp. He went off the jump, through the deactivated stargate—

-and executed a perfect double grab while going through.

Sheppard's jaw dropped. _McKay CAN skateboard! He seems like such an unathletic geek!_

McKay emerged, holding the board under one arm. "Woohoo! That was awesome! Wanna try?"

-

After dismantling the ramp—Sheppard still didn't know where Rodney had gotten the sheets of metal, probably tore down a wall or something—the pair stood on the top stair of the gate room.

"So you're telling me you've never wanted to do something really stupid or dangerous just because it seems fun?" McKay asked, grinning. "I mean, you were an Air Force pilot!"

"Not in the way you mean, probably. Boarding through the gate. My God, McKay, if you're brave enough to do that-"

"That's different," McKay quickly replied. "But you've never had a strange desire to do something so insane you couldn't do it around anybody?"

"Nope," John said evenly.

"You're lying through your teeth. Now's the chance! No one's here! The world is your oyster!"

_Is Rodney giving me a motivational speech?_ Sheppard thought, not believing what he was hearing from McKay, of all people.

"Now that you mention it…" Sheppard smiled.

McKay's grin quickly dropped off his face. "I'm not going to like this, am I?"

-

* * *

A/N: I wrote this before I saw 'The Defiant One,' in which McKay flies the jumper, but I wrote it after 'Hot Zone.' So just pretend that 'Hot Zone' came first for half a chapter.

* * *

"Now, Rodney, it's not _that hard_," Sheppard repeated for the millionth time.

"I can't do it! I've never flown the jumper before!" Rodney sputtered, trying his hardest to get out of it.

Sheppard groaned. "You _can_ do it. You have the Ancient gene. Besides, you're not flying it. You're just making it hover."

"But-"

"Now all you have to do is stick you're hands there and there. Don't move them at all. Don't think about the ship moving. At all. Got it?"

"No! I can't-"

"Good." That shut McKay up tight.

John walked to the now open door in back of the puddlejumper. He clipped the elastic rope to the harness around his ankles. He was about to leap when McKay called out to him.

"This is more insane than skateboarding through the stargate! I know how to skateboard, I have experience. But have you ever been bungee jumping before?"

"No," Sheppard admitted. "But I've always wanted to. Like you said, the world is my oyster," he grinned.

"But I didn't mean-" It was too late. John had already jumped.

_And he thought **I** was nuts for boarding through the gate! But bungee jumping out of the puddlejumper?_ McKay was tempted to look out and see Sheppard's jump, but he was afraid if he moved, he would crash the ship and kill them both.

-

_Hmm. Maybe this was a stupid idea,_ thought Sheppard as he plummeted toward the water. Fast. _Oh God, I hope the cord isn't too long._

Sheppard felt a huge jolt as his sudden stop pulled the jumper down. For a second, he was afraid he was going to pull the jumper down and he would hit the water. But he bounced back up a few more feet, then down again. He bobbled up and down a couple times before stopping about ten feet from the ocean. He hung upside-down by his ankles, waiting, gently swaying in the breeze.

"Uh, Rodney," he called. "You can pull me up any time now."

* * *

Yes, stupid chapter, but it was fun to write! Oh, and to senait: Bring it on! You are _so_ going down! 


	6. Stating the Obvious

Chapter 6: Stating the Obvious

After both Sheppard and McKay had satisfied their inner yearnings to do something spontaneous and stupid, the two of them agreed to stop messing around and get to work finding the rest of the crew. After lunch, of course.

"So, any new ideas about what could have happened?" asked Sheppard munching thoughtfully on a sandwich.

"Well, actually, I was thinking…" McKay replied between bites of a chocolate bar.

"Yes," prompted the major, who had finished his first sandwich and was working on a second.

"Let's start by ruling out the obvious. After all, once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."

"Sir Arthur Conan Doyle," replied Sheppard, recognizing the quote from reading Sherlock Holmes in high school.

McKay ignored the statement and pressed on. "They didn't fly away using the jumpers."

"They weren't kidnapped by the Wraith," added John.

"They didn't die of the nanobot virus," continued Rodney, counting on his fingers as they listed them.

"We didn't fall into a rip in the space-time continuum."

"The Genaii didn't try to take over the city again."

"That evil shadow thing didn't get out and electrocute everyone."

"And there's no way they could still be in the city."

"So what does that leave?" asked John.

"They gated offworld and didn't tell us. Not likely, but possible."

"Definitely not likely," agreed Sheppard. "What else?"

"The only other things I could think of were the Goa'uld ring devices and the Asgard beam transporter."

Sheppard arched an eyebrow. "So you think they were transported out of the city by the Asgard and Goa'uld."

"I never said that," McKay defended, pointing at Sheppard with his candy bar. "You're jumping to conclusions. All I said was that they were the only things I could think of."

"So that was a long, drawn-out way of saying 'I don't know.'" Sheppard countered flatly.

"On the contrary. We eliminated some possibilities and narrowed down the scope."

"No offense, Rodney, but we got nowhere."

"I disagree!"

"You need to learn how to admit you are not omnipotent and can make mistakes."

"No I don't! I know when I'm wrong!"

"Say it with me, Rodney. 'I don't know.'"

"I don't need-"

"Say it," John warned.

"No."

"Three words, Rodney. That's all. Say it."

"No!"

"I. Don't. Know."

"Alright, Alright! I'll admit it! I have no idea what happened!"

Sheppard smiled triumphantly. "There. Now was that so hard?"

"Oh, and I suppose you know exactly where they are," McKay snapped, his voice oozing with sarcasm.

"Nope. But I can admit it easily."

"Oh, shut up."

The next few minutes passed in silence. McKay was positively seething with anger. Sheppard wouldn't have been surprised if McKay suddenly began literally shooting daggers from his icy gaze.

"Did you see the Athosians?" McKay asked out of the blue.

"Er, what?"

Rodney rolled his eyes. "When you were up taking the puddlejumper out for a spin-"

"I wasn't taking it out for a spin! I was checking-"

"Don't interrupt," McKay commanded, rather hypocritically, considering he had just interrupted Sheppard. "Did you see the Athosians when you were out flying the jumper? Did you even check?"

"No…" _Damn. That would've been a good idea._

"Of course you didn't."

Sheppard's eyes narrowed. "Are you implying something, McKay?"

"Not at all. It was just careless of you not to check," Rodney replied with a straight face.

"Careless? Well, who's asking just now instead of while I was out looking?"

"Oh, so now it's my fault! Blame the scientist, who, as you so _kindly_ pointed out, isn't omnipotent! How was I supposed to know that you didn't think to check! I assumed you would!"

"Alright, so I didn't look!"

"Then why don't you, _right now?_" McKay hissed through clenched teeth.

"Okay then, I will!" Sheppard stormed off to the jumper bay.

_He's right. Goddammit, I _hate_ it when he's right!_


	7. ONE problem solved

Chapter 7: ONE problem solved…

A/N: The moment you've all been waiting for: THE EXPLANATION! I'm soooooo sorry for the long wait! I've been kinda busy for the last few weeks, but I'll probably get back on track with the writing soon! Hope my techno jargon isn't too confusing/wrong. I'm not very good at writing it. As long as you get the gist…

* * *

"McKay," Sheppard said into the jumper radio.

"Yes?" McKay replied. Even through the radio, Sheppard could detect the irascible tone still in McKay's voice. "Is anyone there?"

"No. But it's the weirdest thing…"

"What?" Now Rodney was interested.

"There's nothing here."

"This has been established, Major," came McKay's bored reply.

"No, I mean absolutely nothing. It's like the Athosians were never here at all."

There was a pause on the other end of the line. "I need to check something. I'll meet you back in the gate room," he said quickly.

"Wait, McKay" But it was useless. Rodney had already gone off to see whatever it was he had to see. Sheppard sighed, wondering what in the world the scientist had come up with now.

* * *

"C'mon," McKay ordered the second Sheppard set foot in the gate room.

"Geez. Urgent much?" Sheppard said.

Rodney was already walking off. "If, I'm right, then we need to be," he called over his shoulder.

With a few strides, Sheppard caught up quickly to McKay. "So what's the theory this time?"

They arrived at the infirmary and the door whooshed open. Gesturing inside, McKay asked, "What's wrong with this picture?"

Sheppard looked in. Something definitely was missing…"None of the stuff we brought is here," he realized.

"Exactly." McKay crossed his arms across his chest, his mouth a grim slash.

"So the technology bandits came in the middle of the night and took all of the Earth equipment?"

McKay rolled his eyes. He'd obviously forgotten the Major's ability to connect the dots when it came to science. "Of course not. We've already established that no one could possibly"

"Get on with it."

"Yes. I believe that somehow, someway, we've traveled back in time."

Sheppard paused. "Back in time," he repeated skeptically.

"Yes, that's right."

"What is it with you and time conspiracies?"

This drew a scowl from Rodney. "Can you come up with and other explanation for the missing equipment than technology bandits?"

Sheppard shook his head. "No, I can't, but I have trouble accepting the fact that we've traveled back in time."

"Why? It's perfectly logical?" McKay defended his point.

_Perfectly logical?_ Sheppard thought skeptically. Apparently, he and Rodney didn't share the same definition of 'perfectly logical.' "If we've traveled back in time, why isn't Atlantis underwater? And why haven't we noticed mysteriously vanishing technology before now? And how does this explain why we're the only ones gone?"

McKay fidgeted a little. "Well, I'll admit I haven't worked out all the kinks yet, but-"

Sheppard cut him off. "This really sounds like you just took it from a 'Twilight Zone' episode or something."

"'Outer Limits,' actually," McKay muttered.

"What?"

"'The Outer Limits'. It happened on 'The Outer Limits.'"

"See? See, that's why this can't possibly be true, it's based on an 'Outer Limits' episode," Sheppard argued.

"First off, that's flawed logic if I ever heard it, and secondly I haven't heard _you_ make any astoundingly enlightening contributions!" McKay snapped back.

"'Astoundingly enlightening?' As if time travel is 'astoundingly enlightening!'"

"Do you want me to prove it to you? Or are you too busy blowing around hot air and wasting time which, if I'm right, _we don't have_!"

"Alright, then_ prove _it! Give me one iota of evidence other than the disappearing technology, which doesn't show anything!"

"Okay, then, I will!" McKay promptly switched into 'lecture-ramble mode' and began his long explanation. "Time is not a straight line."

Sheppard promptly interrupted. "Okay, stop right there. What the hell are you talking about?"

McKay scoffed. "_You_ wanted the proof, here's the proof. Now let me _talk_. Anyways, time is rather like water in a tube– if you tilt it the right way, it'll go back and forth. _Now_ do you understand?" he added peevishly.

"Okay, fine,"

"Now, normally time flows forward. Well, duh. Anyway, if we keep with the water in a tube model, normal time would be a consistent flow downhill. It is possible for the flow of time to be reversed; instead the water flows uphill."

"Uphill?"

"Would you quit interrupting! Yes, uphill. Obviously, this doesn't happen normally. Something needs to happen to disrupt the fabric of time-space and reverse the flow."

"Like?"

"Rips in the"

Sheppard cut McKay off. "Okay, I am _sick_ of hearing about rips in the space time continuum. Get to the point."

"That…was…the point."

"So that's it," Sheppard stated flatly.

McKay thought for a second, and then nodded. "Yeah, pretty much."

"We have been sucked through a tear in space-time."

"Yeah, that's the way it looks."

"So just how did this tear occur?"

"I…uh, er" McKay stuttered.

"Space-time doesn't just rip."

"That it doesn't."

"You don't know do you?" John asked pointedly.

"No. Not, really, no," Rodney admitted quietly.

Sheppard let out a giant sigh. "You gave me that whole explanation and it _still_ doesn't prove anything."

"Yes, it"

"You simply restated physics theories. You have no evidence to back it up," the major said forcefully, getting pissed.

McKay threw Sheppard a venomous glare. "I could prove it if we had the time to"

"You are saying that on the assumption that you are right!"

"Of course I'm right! How could this not be right! We already know time travel is possible! Remember, the Dr. Weir from another reality?"

"For one thing, the other Dr. Weir had a time_ machine_, not a so-called time _rip_.And why is all the stuff gone now and not earlier?" John asked

"Time rip, time machine, they both do the same thing! I can think of three ways off the top of my head to prove I'm right!" Rodney snarled.

"If you're right—_if _being the key word—then how are we going to get time back to where it normally is?"

"Well, theoretically, once time stops going backward it will reverse itself and then we'd be back where time normally is."

"'Theoretically?'"

"Considering this has never happened before, theoretically is the best I can give you. But as long as we don't do anything that changes the timeline, we should be fine in that regard."

"Then what's the problem? Why don't you go prove that you're right? Because I know you'd jump at the chance to!"

"Because they all take a lot of _time_," McKay huffed. "And _time_ is not something we have, as I stated earlier!"

"If we've gone _back_ in time, then how could we not have any of it?" Sheppard countered. "It seems to me we'd have quite a bit of time."

"No, no we don't! I'm not entirely sure how much time we do have, but it's probably not enough!"

"Would you quit being so goddamned obtuse and just give me some straight answers?" Sheppard snapped, getting sick of McKay's beating around the bush.

"I don't think we've stopped traveling back in time yet."

"What makes you" Sheppard began to argue.

McKay cut him off mid-sentence. "The disappearing stuff. See? See, I have thought this out! If we had stopped traveling back, it would have disappeared a long time ago."

"Alright, point taken. But how does that make us not have any time? It seems to me that we'd have even more. What's the big problem?" Sheppard asked with a shrug. "We'll get back fine and all we have to do is wait it out. What's so urgent?"

"I'm not worried about time getting back. I'm worried about how far back we will go," McKay grimly replied.

"What, do you think we'll travel far enough back to the Wraith attack on Atlantis?"

"No, no, not at all. We know that the city's shield holds and the Wraith can't get by," McKay irritably replied, as if the answer should have been completely obvious.

"Then what the hell _are_ you so upset about!"

"I'm afraid we may go as far back as the plague that nearly wiped out the ancients. And if that happens, since we both have the ATA gene, we're both vulnerable to it."


	8. Still more complications

Chapter 8: Still more complications

"WHAT!"

"Yes."

A groan escaped Sheppard's lips. "Could this possibly get any worse?"

McKay held up his finger. "Actually, we could" he began.

"Don't answer that. I really don't need to know." Sheppard paused and thought for a second. "Well, if we do go far enough back that we run into the plague, it shouldn't be a problem, right? The city will just put itself into lockdown and the plague would be contained, right?"

"Umm…"

"Don't answer that either."

Rodney went forth and told him anyway. "That's not a guarantee. It wouldn't have been much of a plague if it had been contained, now would it? It's possible that the city only 'learned' the behavior as a result of the plague."

"Dammit." Sheppard swore loudly, pounding his fist against the wall of the infirmary. He turned back to Rodney. "But we don't even know if you're right. You could be wrong."

In a typical instance of McKay-ness, he snorted and proclaimed, "Of course I'm not wrong."

"But what if you are?" Sheppard countered.

"Well, I'm not, so it doesn't matter. Now we need to"

"But _what if you are_!"

McKay sighed impatiently. "I'm not. End of story. And I, for one, really don't want to die a horribly slow, gruesome, and painful death by way of plague, so let's find"

"How can you prove it? You said there were at least three ways to prove you were right."

"And I also said that they take a lot of time! Now _we need to go_!"

Sheppard threw his arms up. "Where? Where do we need to go?"

"To somewhere quarantined where we're not going to get infected by a plague."

"Can't we check on the way there?"

McKay began bouncing up and down on his tiptoes with irritation. "No, no we can't. Can we _please_ go now?"

"We're in an infirmary, I doubt the virus is here," Sheppard countered. After McKay couldn't come up with a descent rebuttal for that statement, the major moved on. "How exactly can you prove it?"

"Well, there's the easiest way to prove I'm right, and then there's the harder way which will prove how far back we've gone,"

"Gimmie the easy one," Sheppard said exasperatedly, wondering why McKay couldn't just do that in the first place.

"Well, the stars and planets wouldn't be in the same positions they are in now thousands of years ago. If we took the jumper into orbit, we could cross-reference the positions of the stars with starcharts"

"Which are on the laptops which have disappeared," finished Sheppard flatly.

McKay opened his mouth to respond and then snapped it shut. "Yes, that's right. But if we've gone back a significant enough period of time, then the change should be visible enough to not need starcharts."

"Okay, then," Sheppard sighed. "Then let's go."

"No! Why?"

"Because you just convinced me that we need to go out and see if you're correct."

"I wasn't trying to convince you of anything! I was merely stating it could be done!" McKay cried, getting panicky.

"Why wouldn't we go? The jumper's airtight, so no plague will get in," John shrugged.

"Yes, but if we take the jumper up and have Hive ships and Darts awaiting us…" McKay left the sentence hanging.

"Come on, Rodney. That was, what, 10,000 years ago? We couldn't possibly have traveled that far already."

"Yes, but I don't want"

"Wouldn't you just love to prove your right?" Sheppard egged him on, knowing that would convince Rodney to do anything.

Apparently, it was working. Rodney had a brief internal struggle whether to stay safe or get an "I told you so" on Sheppard. "I told you so" won out.

"Oh, alright."

* * *

Sheppard flew the jumper out into orbit. The ship sat there for a few seconds, before McKay asked in an annoyed tone of voice, "Well?"

"Well what?" the major asked wearily, wondering what Rodney could possibly expect him to do.

"Well, are the stars different or not?" McKay asked with his arms crossed.

Sheppard shot Rodney the nastiest glare he could muster. "You're kidding me, right?"

"What?"

"Do you actually think I pay attention to the stars?"

McKay threw his hands up. "You fly the jumper! I just figured that you might use them as markers in the sky or something!"

"Well, I'm usually a little busy _flying the jumper _to make a mental map! Why don't you pay attention? You're the passenger, who has nothing to concentrate on."

Rodney fidgeted a little. It was obvious that he was trying to come up with an excuse so he didn't sound completely oblivious.

_Hah! _Sheppard thought joyfully.

"Well, if this isn't going to help any, we should probably head back to Atlantis," McKay said, changing the subject. He got up and walked to the back of the jumper. Sheppard had no idea what he was going to do there, and didn't really want to know. _Probably just going back there to sulk and avoid being ridiculed for not paying any more attention that I did_, he thought smugly.

A few minutes later, the jumper broke through the atmosphere of the planet. As he was flying, Sheppard did a double take. He squinted his eyes to make sure he was seeing things right, that this wasn't some crazy mirage. He double checked the navigation computer; no, he was definitely heading in the right direction.

"McKay," he said nervously.

Rodney was completely absorbed in whatever he was doing in the back of the puddlejumper, not wanting to be disturbed. "What?" he snapped.

"Look."

He snarled and glanced up. Ocean. Nothing interesting at all. "So?"

"Where's the city?"

McKay did a double take. "Uhh, on the other side of the planet," he responded, as if it was a stupid question.

"No, the nav computer says we're heading in the right direction," Sheppard said frowning.

"Are you sure it's working?"

"Yes, of course I'm sure! And besides, the mainland's over there, so the city should be straight ahead of us!"

McKay stood up, put his hand over his brow to cut down the glare, and stared out the jumper window. "Oh my god," he said after a few seconds.

"What? What is it?"

"I think the city's underwater."

Sheppard gaped. After excessive squinting, he could just barely make out the outline of something big below the ocean's surface.

"I _am_ right! Ha!" McKay celebrated. John half expected him to do a little victory dance, and he probably would have had they not been in the jumper.

"Damn," was all Sheppard could muster. He pulled the puddlejumper into a gentle dive.

"What are you doing?" McKay asked uneasily.

"Well, what do you think I'm doing?" Sheppard asked sarcastically. "We're going back to the city."

"What? You can't do that! In case you hadn't noticed, the city has _sunken_!"

"Do we have much of a choice?"

"Can this thing even _go_ underwater!" McKay asked uneasily, looking around in the puddlejumper.

"Let's find out, shall we?" Sheppard said, putting the ship into a dive.

"Oh, Christ," McKay muttered, sitting down in the copilot's seat and holding on for dear life.

_Of course the thing can go underwater,_ thought Sheppard. _Why couldn't it?_ _It's spaceproof, why not waterproof? It makes sense!_

"Slow down, unless you want to kill us both, major!" McKay warned. "Don't hit the water too fast!"

This brought on an eye roll from John. Of course he knew enough simple physics to slow down. They trained you for situations like this in the Air Force.

It wasn't smooth, and it wasn't pretty, but the puddlejumper entered the water without incident.

Almost.

McKay tried to pick up the remaining strands of dignity as he pulled himself up off the floor.

"Well, _that_ was stupid." McKay muttered under his breath. "God, remind me never to do that again. We're lucky this thing didn't completely buckle when it hit the water and WOULD YOU STOP LAUGHING!"

John was barely keeping the jumper in a straight line he was laughing so hard. Damn, that had been quite a jolt, but seeing McKay get dumped on his ass was quite worth it.

"Sheppard!" McKay blurted out, the sound of panic rising quickly in his voice.

"Yes? What?" he responded, wiping tears from the corners of his eyes.

"The city's shield! We're not gonna be able to get through the shield!"

Sheppard immediately sobered up and turned to Rodney. "This would have been nice to know beforehand!"

"Well, you should have realized it too!" McKay countered.

"We can argue about this later! Quick, how do I deactivate the shield?"

"Don't be stupid! That would flood the city. Besides, there's no way to do that from outside Atlantis! Why do you think it's a shield?"

"Then how are we supposed to get in?"

"I have no idea! Transmit an IDC or something!"

"How the hell do you expect me to do that?"

"I don't know! You're the one with the big fancy gene!"

"You have it too! And _you're _the scientist!"

"and not the pilot! Pull up, Sheppard, you're going to crash! _Pull up_!" McKay screeched, waving his arms wildly.

"It's too late! We wouldn't be able to make it!"

"Oh, _HELL_!" McKay slouched down in the copilot's seat and brought his arm up over his face. Sheppard braced his body for a very painful impact and hoped that whatever God watched over the Pegasus galaxy didn't want to see them squished like a fly on a windshield.

The jumper passed through the shield.

Sheppard gave McKay a triumphant smile.

"I knew that was going to happen," McKay said, sitting up in his seat.


	9. Of Graphs and Broken Hands

A/N: I have decided on a definite time period for this story: it takes place between "Sanctuary" and "Brotherhood." I know "sanctuary" aired about three weeks or so after I started this fic, but I just had to diss Chaya! _Gad_ I hated that episode…

* * *

Chapter 9: Of Graphs and Broken Hands

"Well _that _was a complete and total waste of time," Sheppard grumbled.

"Don't blame me! _You_ were the one who was all gung-ho, let's go out there and almost get killed! It wasn't _my_ fault!"

"Of course it wasn't, Rodney," came the sarcastic mutter.

"What was that, Sheppard?" McKay snapped.

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing," Sheppard replied loftily.

McKay glared and crossed his arms. "Now that we've established that I'm right, why don't we go find a quarantined area to wait it out?"

The major leaned in toward McKay and stated blankly "We haven't reached the battle with the Wraith yet, there's still time." McKay blustered a little, trying to come up with a scathing response, but had little success.

"Why don't we go down to the room where they keep the ZPMs and measure how many of them have been depleted? We could get a rough estimate that way," Sheppard suggested.

"I was getting to that," McKay said quickly.

When Rodney wasn't looking, John rolled his eyes. "I'm sure you were."

McKay didn't even catch the remark. He began walking away, muttering the entire time. "…could take measurements every 15 minutes or so and then plot them on a "time vs. depletion" graph. That would be so much easier if we had the laptops, but nothing I can't handle. Anyway, we'll need…"

* * *

"McKay." 

Rodney practically jumped a foot into the air. "Don't do that!" he hissed. He leaned back down over the ZPM he was taking measurements on and muttered to himself quietly.

"Sorry," Sheppard apologized, clearly not meaning it. "Why are you so jumpy anyway?"

McKay began wildly waving around the tools he was working with. "Because, if I break the ZPM or a connection, we could change our timeline so that when we arrive here in the future, the shield doesn't hold and we all drown. Now, you wouldn't want that would you?" After thinking for a second, he continued, "Hmm. Actually that could prove interesting. In the last timeline, _I_ was the one who nobly died in the flooding gateroom. I'd like to see what you would do in that situation."

"Oh, gee. Thanks for being so supportive," Sheppard growled.

Either completely missing the sarcasm or choosing to ignore it, McKay responded without looking up, "Any time. So what did you want?"

"Huh? Oh, yes. If we go far enough back, we'll meet the Ancients, right?" Sheppard said, leaning casually against the ZPM case.

"Maybe, yes. Why? Do you think you'll meet your Ancient floozy from Proculus in the past?"

"She was not a floozy!"

"Hah!" McKay snorted. "Don't make me laugh."

"You're just jealous because I got an alien love interest before you did," Sheppard taunted.

"Oh, please. Do you honestly think I care, Captain Kirk?"

"If I'm Kirk, then that makes you Spock. Or Bones. Yes, he never got the alien girl and he was sarcastic to boot."

McKay began grumbling. "Well, you're only upset because I was right about her."

"Whatever you say, Bones."

"Oh, go get beamed up or something."

Sheppard sighed and turned around. There wasn't much else to do down here. He looked around the room for anything to occupy his mind. He glanced over a shelf and did a double take. A huge grin spread across his face. Oh, did he have the greatest idea…

* * *

"Hey, McKay."

Rodney turned around, not too happy about being interrupted again. "What is it?" he said through clenched teeth.

"Punch me."

McKay's eyes opened wide and he arched an eyebrow. "What?"

"Punch me. You know you want to," Sheppard goaded.

"I'm not going to deny that, but we don't have the time-"

John put on the puppy dog face. "Aww, come on, Rodney! You're no fun! I promise we can go hide from the evil virus just as soon as you punch me."

McKay stopped and considered for a second. It seemed like a win/win situation. They got to safety _and_ he got to deck the major in the face. He reeled his arm back and put every ounce of strength he had into the blow.

A flash of green light and a sickening crunch echoed throughout the room.

"Ah, _CHRIST_!" McKay screamed, holding his hand.

John could barely control his laughter. "Wahoo! This thing's great!" he chirped, pointing to the personal shield on his chest. He had worn his jacket over it so McKay hadn't seen the device.

"Dammit, major, I needed that hand!" Rodney moaned.

"We need to try something else! Where's the nearest balcony?"

"…every frigging bone in my hand is broken. Oh, I can't feel my fingers."

Sheppard rolled his eyes. "Stop being so melodramatic. It wasn't that great of a punch anyway. Can you wiggle your fingers?"

McKay held his hand up limply. His index finger twitched a little before he yelped and began complaining again.

"Here. Take this," Sheppard said, handing McKay his 9mm.

McKay held the gun in his good hand. He looked from Sheppard, down to the gun, up to Sheppard, and back to the gun again. After turning it over once or twice, in the blink of the eye he brought it up and shot Sheppard in the head without warning.

Sheppard cringed. It had been a great shot. "Dammit, McKay!"

McKay looked at him innocently. "What? You gave me the gun, what did you expect me to do?"

"I expected you to shoot me in the leg! That's what I did to you!"

"Wow," McKay said, a wide smile growing across his face. "That was a lot more fun then I imagined." He began snickering.

"Yeah, well, don't get used to it," Sheppard muttered. McKay got waaaayyy too much enjoyment out of shooting him, and that made Sheppard only a little nervous…

Now Rodney was giggling maniacally. "Do you have your P-90? Let's try it on automatic!"

The major slowly began edging away from McKay. _Dear Lord, I've created a monster,_ he thought uneasily.

"I think that's enough," Sheppard said, mentally deactivating the shield. "Why don't you get back to work?" He pocketed the device.

McKay scowled loudly, both at a missed chance to cause harm to Sheppard and the fact that John had easily turned off the shield, whereas he had almost "starved to death." Now in a sour mood, he turned back to the ZPM.

For an hour and a half, they sat down there. McKay at least had something to occupy himself, taking readings on the ZPMs every 15 minutes and making a graph. Sheppard however, was bored out of his skull. After pulling the personal shield stunt of Rodney, he was being completely ignored. John half-considered gating offworld to find something interesting and seeing how long it would take Rodney to notice.

When McKay finished making measurements, he spent a good twenty minutes drawing a makeshift graph. There was no paper around, so McKay used a Sharpie marker he carried in his pocket and drew on the floor.

Sheppard walked up behind McKay, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor, bent over his work. "So when are we?"

He held his hand up to silence Sheppard. He had bandaged his 'injury' using a knotted piece of cloth. Sheppard hovered over his shoulder, trying to understand what McKay was doing.

"Quit looking over my shoulder. I can't work like that." When John leaned back a little, McKay went on to answer his question. "Right now it looks like we're somewhere between 7,000 and 5,000 years in the past."

"Isn't that a rather large margin of error?"

"Well, it would be if it was a linear relationship. But it's not, it's quadratic. I can't be exact without the proper technology. It would be much easier to graph if I had my laptop because then I could come up with a line of best fit equation. But I don't, so that's the best I can give you." After pausing for a second, McKay said quietly, "Hmm. This is interesting." He stared intently at the graph.

Sheppard leaned over to see what was so 'interesting.' It was just a curved line for all he saw.

"What?"

"If we extrapolate the points so that they hit the y-axis, we can find out when this whole thing started. But this doesn't make sense. According to the graph, the rip in space-time occurred sometime between 5 and 6 last _night_, not this morning. I'm speaking relatively or course. It wasn't really last night, but it was to us."

"So?" Sheppard asked wearily, trying to make sense of the mathematical babble.

"_So_ it's just a little surprising that we didn't notice anything before noon today. Well, what would have been noon, had we still been in today."

"Stop it, Rodney. Temporal-speak gives me a headache."

"Come to think of it, I don't think I saw Kavanaugh last night…er, 10,000 years in the future," Rodney said, ignoring John's request. "No wonder it was so quiet in the lab."


	10. Meanwhile

A/N: (nightpheonix runs in) Hi all! (she ducks as fans of this story all throw rotten tomatoes) Hey, I- ow! Stop-ow! Okay, I'm soooo sorry for the long wait; it was a combination of a few busy weeks and my muse going on strike. Can you all ever possibly forgive me? (Fans of the story glare and lower tomatoes, but vow to throw them if the chapter isn't good)

A/N 2: Thanx to Jennifer Ruest for giving me the idea for this chapter! I'll probably only go a few chapters with it, but it offers a nice plot digression, don't you think? Thanks also to peachkins whose review got me off my lazy ss to finally update this story! Translations for the Czech are at the bottom of the page.  
6/8/05- sorry for the inaccuricies, they're fixed now!

Chapter 10: Meanwhile…

"So tell me again what happened," Dr. Weir said wearily, sitting back in her chair with her hand covering her eyes.

Kavanaugh scowled. "I already told you. Three times," he irritably replied.

"Dr. Zelenka wasn't here those other times, and I think he needs to hear this. Please humor me, Doctor." It was no secret to Weir that Kavanaugh disliked her more than anyone else on the base, and Zelenka was probably a close third, right after McKay.

Another scowl. "Fine. Last night I-"

"What time last night?" Zelenka interjected from where he was standing behind her desk.

"I don't know. Six-thirty, maybe. May I continue?" Radek nodded and motioned with his hand for Kavanaugh to go on. "I was working in my lab and-"

Another interruption, this time by Elizabeth. "What were you working on?"

"What does that have anything to do with it?" Kavanaugh asked exasperatedly.

"If whatever you were working on caused this, then we need to know so we can figure out how to reverse the effects," Zelenka defended.

"We're just covering all the bases," added Weir. _Christ, we sound like a bunch of TV cops questioning a suspect_, she thought.

"I was writing a report on a new Ancient device I found! Now let me finish and please stop interrupting me!" Kavanugh glared around the room, as if daring Radek or Weir to say anything. When silence persisted, he continued, "Thank you. I must have fallen asleep or something because the next thing I knew the lab was empty. I walked out into the hall to see in anyone was out there. No one was. I checked the usual places for people to be: the mess hall, control room, a few other labs. They were all completely empty."

"So what then?" Zelenka asked.

Kavanaugh fixed him with the nastiest glower he could manage. "Well, what do you think I would do? I was the only person in the entire city!"

Zelenka appeared to ponder this for a second, then shuddered involuntarily and decided it was best to _not_ think about what Kavanaugh would do with no one else around.

Kavanaugh did not notice, and pressed on. "Obviously, I tried to figure out what had happened to everyone. I looked in the jumper bay, checked the gate power logs, and-"

Elizabeth queried, "How long did that take?" When Kavanaugh began to bluster, she cut him off, saying, "You need to be very specific, Doctor. Understand we need to know the exact sequence of events to see if there is any connection between your story and their disappearance."

He started to come up with a snarky comeback, when he realized that she was right. _Dammit, I hate when that happens!_ Sulkily, he answered, "Probably around 11:30. Nothing showed up in my investigations. It was like no one was ever there. Even the supplies we brought were gone. About half an hour later- that's at midnight-" Kavanaugh added, as if just waiting for someone to interrupt him. "-that…that…" He snapped his fingers to recall the name. "…the Russian astrophysicist-"

"Markova?" Radek offered.

"Yeah, him. He showed up, and had no idea what was going on. Within the next 20 minutes, the rest of the Atlantis crew showed up, and no one even seemed to know anything was wrong. Happy?"

Elizabeth turned around and looked at Zelenka. He nodded, and she turned back around. "Yes, that's fine, Doctor."

"May I go _now?_" Kavanaugh hissed.

Elizabeth sighed. "Very well then. Go." She motioned toward the door and Kavanaugh eagerly strode out. Radek glared venomously at the retreating Kavanaugh. As soon as the door to her office slid shut, he muttered under his breath, "_Malý_ _pitomec_."

Elizabeth had no idea what this meant, but she was sure she agreed with whatever it was. Kavanaugh was, simply put, an egotistical bastard. Rumors were flying that he was _happy _about Sheppard and McKay being missing. And she didn't doubt them.

"So what do you make of it?" Weir asked, turning to Zelenka.

Behind his circular glasses, Zelenka's eyes were clouded. He wore a frown on his face.

"I do not know how this would be possible. It makes no sense that everyone disappears and then reappears, except Rodney and the major."

"You don't think he's lying, do you? Does he know something about where they are that he's not telling us?"

"No, definitely not. I would not put it past Dr. Kavanaugh, but he is not creative enough to come up with something this elaborate."

Elizabeth smiled inwardly. The good Dr. Zelenka was never shy about expressing his feelings on Kavanaugh. Especially if he could express them to Kavanaugh's face in Czech.

The situation was almost overly-ironic. Rodney and the major were easily two of the most valuable people in Atlantis, if not _the_ most, and they both mysteriously went missing at the exact same time. That made her suspect a plot of some sort because neither of them would have gone this long without some contact. But she couldn't fathom who on her team would do such a thing, never mind who would actually be able to capture either of them successfully. Both John and McKay had been in hostage situations before, and they both could either find a way out or some way to inform her of where they were.

Just then, Sergeant Bates entered Weir's office. He wore a grave expression. He gave her a curt nod, saying, "Ma'am."

"Yes, sergeant?"

Bates was having a field day, hovering around the city interviewing everyone as to when the last time was that they had seen McKay and Sheppard. He had interrogated the entire base thoroughly, along with the Athosians on the mainland. He also was heading an investigation on the mainland to see if the two missing persons were there.

"Neither the Athosians nor the preliminary search parties found anything on the mainland," he reported morosely.

Elizabeth sighed deeply and Zelenka slumped a little. The mainland had been their last lead, their last option, the last hope they had of finding Sheppard and McKay. Now it would be near impossible to do _anything_, short of exploring thousands of planets inch by inch.

"The last time anyone saw either of them was around was around 0000 hours last night," the sergeant continued. Radek and Weir exchanged glances. It couldn't have been a coincidence that Kavanaugh's story ended at midnight. But what did it mean?

"Permission to return to the mainland with more teams, ma'am," Bates asked.

"Granted," Elizabeth said. Bates strode out, leaving her and Zelenka musing in silence.

"12:00. Too much of a coincidence," Radek though aloud.

"I agree, but what's the connection?"

He pushed his glasses up on his nose. "Can anyone verify Kavanaugh's story? Did the same thing happen to anyone else?"

Elizabeth sighed for what seemed like the thousandth time today. "We asked Markova, who said that suddenly everyone disappeared and the only person around for about 15 minutes was Kavanaugh. Some people also had this happen to them. But from what I'm hearing, it sounded like most people arrived at the same time, with a few before and a few after. A couple other people said they also noticed missing technology throughout the night, but no one was really working at the time. The funny thing is, no one noticed Kavanaugh was missing. Apparently, everyone thought he had locked himself into a lab for some peace."

Radek looked embarrassed and fidgeted a little. "Well, he does that very often. And he isn't exactly well-liked among the scientists. Either no one noticed or no one cared."

This comment made Weir a little peeved. How could anyone not notice someone mysteriously vanishing into thin air? However, a part of her sympathized with the scientists. Truthfully, she probably wouldn't have cared too much if she had found out Kavanaugh had gone missing either. She knew that was a terrible thing, but…oh, hell, she hated him almost as much as he hated her! But the truth of the matter was Kavanaugh wasn't missing now. Rodney and John were. She looked at her watch. It was almost 0830 now, and the two had been missing for almost 9 hours.

Nine hours. And the city was already in chaos.

So how was it? (prepares to duck at the first sight of tomatoes)

**Translation:**

malý pitomec- little idiot


	11. Still Meanwhile

A/N: Sorry, I know I said this chapter'd be up in a couple days like 2 weeks ago, but we had final exams, and then I didn't have access to my computer for a few days, and then, well…you get the picture. I'll be updating MUCH more frequently now that's its summer, I PROMISE! Same deal with the translations as last chapter. Kinda short chapter, I know, but this one's a little more interesting than the last.

**Klenotka- **I'm very sorry for any inaccuracies! I only have one dictionary, and it's not a very good one. I'm absolutely terrible at other languages, so thanks for the help! I got someone who speaks Czech to help me in this chap!

**Aria-hannah**- Shh! You're giving away my plot points, lol!

Chapter 11: Still Meanwhile…

"_Tohle je fakt špatnej den_!" Zelenka screamed at the life signs detector. "_Zatracený_!" he swore as the cable he was trying to hook the Ancient device up to slipped. The sharp end of the wire made a thin slice across his finger. He pointed at the piece of technology and yelled more obscenities at it, until Dr. Weir entered his lab.

"No luck, I gather?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No," Radek hissed with forced calmness. "Our attempts at recalibrating the life signs detector to only pick up specific energy signatures appear to be misguided." He looked at his finger and sucked on the cut, irritably glaring at the machine sitting innocently on the table. He took his finger out of his mouth and viciously slammed the laptop on the desk shut.

Weir was nonplussed. Zelenka had gone down to his lab shortly after their meeting on her orders to try to make the life signs detector pick up the major and McKay's signs in the low hopes they could find something they missed in their searches. He had told her it would be a long shot; that these things weren't meant to single out specific people. But there really wasn't much else she could do. There was nothing she hated more than only being able to stand by helplessly as the rest of her team was frantically doing everything they could to find John and Rodney. And the real reason why she was down in the lab didn't make her feel any better about the situation.

"Bates just returned from the mainland," she reported uneasily.

"Oh? And did he find anything this time?" Zelenka turned his gaze from the life signs detector to her. She shook her head 'no.' He looked down again, his expression clearly reading, "So what else is new?" This had been the third search, and it was nearing noon. Half a day with no word.

Radek began rummaging around the room, looking for a first-aid kit for his cut. Elizabeth stood awkwardly in the doorway, not sure how to break the news to Zelenka.

"Ah!" he interjected as he pulled a small plastic case out of a satchel. As he rummaged through the contents of the kit, he asked, "Was there anything else you wanted?"

She sighed. Now or never. "I've told Sergeant Bates to stop searching."

Zelenka dropped the band-aid he was holding and looked up at her, confusion in his eyes. "What?"

"I don't like it either, Radek," she said defensively. "If I didn't have to run the city, I would keep looking until we found something. But that's not the case. We can't put this whole operation on suspension waiting for McKay and the major to return."

"So we're just giving up on them?" Zelenka asked dejectedly.

"By no means. But it's time to keep Atlantis running. I know better than anyone how important John and Rodney are to the city. But as vital an asset as they both are, I have two hundred-odd other people here who we can't forget about." She paused and a silence passed between them. When he didn't acknowledge her comments, she added, "You know as well as I do that Major Sheppard and Dr. McKay are perfectly capable of defending themselves against almost anything."

Radek frowned and fiddled with the bow of his glasses. He sighed. "You're right."

Elizabeth was slightly surprised by this reaction. She had been expecting an angry defense of McKay and Sheppard, saying, "We shouldn't leave them out there, for all we know they could be stuck somewhere and not able to contact us." At the very least she had expected him to suggest keeping a few teams off-duty to continue searching.

Then she realized: she had been envisioning how John and Rodney would have reacted to her decision had they been searching for someone. The two of them absolutely hated the idea leaving people behind, and would have given her endless hell. She smiled inwardly. _You know you're spending too much time around those two when you expect everyone to argue your decisions_, she thought, mildly amused.

However, she believed that both Sheppard and McKay would not want her to expend all of Atlantis' energy looking for them.

She just hoped dearly that, wherever they were, they could handle themselves.

Elizabeth was brought out of her musings by Zelenka suggesting, "Grodin is still experimenting with the biometric sensor array, maybe we could somehow-"

Suddenly, a Russian scientist burst in breathing heavily, accompanied shortly after by a sergeant.

"Dr. Weir…Dr. Zelenka," he gasped, "Down…in the…"

The military officer decided to give the poor scientist a hand, and finished, "You have to see this!"

**Translations:**

Tohle je fakt špatnej den – "This is turning into a very bad day"

zatracený- damn


	12. Meanwhile Yet Again

A/N: Sorry for the wait. Do you know how much it sucks to be sick _and _to have computer problems in the same week? It wasn't pretty. But I put up 2 chapters to make up for the wait.

Chapter 12: Meanwhile yet again…

A transporter trip and fifteen minutes worth of jogging later, Zelenka, Elizabeth, the Russian physicist, and the sergeant arrived in the laboratory where the three now-depleted ZPMs were. Weir looked around. Not even a week ago, she'd found out that in a different universe, she'd gone back in time and rotated the ZPMs in order to conserve power so the shields would hold and save the expedition in _this_ timeline. It was somewhat bizarre to think that an alternate reality version of herself was the only reason they were all alive today. She cleared her thoughts and focused back on the problem at hand. Time travel gave her a headache anyway.

"So what is it we need to see so badly?" she asked, trying not to sound

"This," the physicist said, pointing to something on the floor. A messy, hastily-drawn graph was scrawled there in what looked like very faded permanent marker.

"It looks like it just appeared there," offered the sergeant.

"It definitely wasn't here before," she agreed. The graph was in the middle of the ground, pretty hard to miss.

Radek leaned over, and then squatted down next to it. "That can't be-" he began.

"McKay's handwriting?" she queried.

"Yes!" Zelenka said, shrugging in confusion. "I'd recognize it anywhere." It wasn't so much handwriting as it was scribbles that somewhat resembled letters. Quite distinctive.

"So, what does it say?" she asked. Elizabeth had barely been able to decipher Rodney's scrawl on a good day, never mind when he was in a rush. The fact that the writing was faded didn't help at all either.

Radek bent over the graph and lifted his glasses to his forehead. "Well, that is a little difficult to say," he admitted, leaning a little closer. Letting his glasses slip back down onto his nose, he turned to the Russian. "Did you have this analyzed? How old is it?"

"_How old is it?" _ Elizabeth though, thoroughly confused. _What a strange question…_

The other scientist nodded. "I triple checked the results." He paused, as if what he was about to say would completely qualify him for an admission to a mental hospital. "It appears to be several thousand years old."

"What? How is that possible?" Weir asked, completely flabbergasted.

"I don't know. Yet," Radek replied cryptically. Once again he turned to the physicist, asking, "That device Kavanaugh found earlier yesterday, did it come with any text?"

The Russian nodded. "The translation isn't finished, but-"

"Doesn't matter; get it for me." When no one moved, he ordered sharply, "Now, please!" The other scientist skittered out of the room, leaving Zelenka muttering "_Jezisi_!"

"What's going on?" she forcefully demanded. _Someone had better give me a straight explanation…_ she though grimly.

"I'm not entirely sure, but it appears Rodney and the major may have…gone back in time," he finished, sounding amazed.

However, there was no way his amazement could match Elizabeth Weir's. "Back in time?" Not exactly the straight explanation she had been looking for. "How?"

"Like I said, I'm not quite sure, but as soon as I can read that text that came with Kavanaugh's machine…" He trailed off and began examining the graph once again. Weir frowned. Apparently, she was going to be left in a complete fog until Zelenka decided to enlighten her.

Even running at full tilt, the poor Russian took almost half an hour to go to Kavanaugh's lab and back. During that time, Zelenka had grown increasingly irritated. When the physicist returned, holding the computer before him like a Holy Grail, Radek was about ready to explode. He snapped his fingers impatiently, not at all unlike a certain Canadian Chief of Staff, Science Division. For fear of having his head bitten off, the physicist practically threw the laptop to Radek. He began quickly scanning the writing on the computer and mumbling under his breath. "Ah!" he finally exclaimed.

"What is it?"

"According to this, the device creates an unstable rent in the fabric of space-time!" Radek triumphantly proclaimed.

Elizabeth sighed. "Let's assume for a second that I didn't understand what you just said." What was the use in Zelenka learning to speak perfect English if he was just going to confuse the hell out of everyone? Well, confuse the hell out of her at any rate. The Russian seemed to understand perfectly, if the gasp of comprehension was any indication.

Fortunately, Zelenka was much more patient with explanations than many other scientists (a certain Rodney McKay, for example). He gave Elizabeth a crash course in time travel theory. When he finished a few minutes later, Weir's head was buzzing. A little more than a year ago she had believed that time travel was a thing of Hollywood and now her commanding military officer and chief science officer were trapped in the past.

"Why anyone would invent such a thing is beyond me," he continued, switching into 'ramble-mode' "It must have been a failed experiment with time travel that was abandoned when the Ancients realized it could not fix and hold a stable wormhole back in time."

Elizabeth rubbed her temples. "So how did it turn on?"

"Kavanaugh thought it was another portable holograph projector, so he left it in his lab out in the open. If someone with the ATA gene came in and touched it inadvertently, then it would have activated and…" Zelenka made a whirling motion with his hand, as if to say, "You know the rest."

He handed her the laptop. It looked rather unassuming for something so dangerous. Yeah, yeah, appearances can be deceiving and all that. It was a small, spherical object that looked like it could have fit in the palm of her hand. The typical Ancient pattern of blue lights was interlaced all around the bottom half. The top hemisphere was blackened. She could sort of see how it might be confused as a hologram projector…then again, this _was_ Kavanaugh they were talking about here.

"See, if I'm right, McKay was figuring out how fast they were traveling back in time using the depletion rate of the ZPMs," he continued, gesturing to the graph.

"Eventually they'll arrive back in this time?" she asked.

Zelenka nodded. "Well, provided they don't change the past too drastically. But if McKay figured out what was happening, he'd hopefully have enough common sense to focus on damage control and laying low.

"And there's nothing we can do," Elizabeth concluded.

"No," Radek replied after a short pause.

Weir sighed. At this point in the expedition, the situation really shouldn't be fazing her. She supposed she was going to have to get used to this sort of thing if it was going to happen frequently. Oh, wait, it already did.

Yep, time travel _really_ gave her a headache.

**Translation:**

Jezisi- Oh my God.


	13. Gratuitous Pop Culture Reference Chapter

A/N: We're back to our regular storyline now, I probably won't pick up on the current-day Atlantis plot again, but anything's open.

Chapter 13: The Gratuitous Pop Culture Reference Chapter

"So…what now?" asked Sheppard in a bored tone of voice.

McKay stood up from his seat on the on the floor next to the graph. "Well, first off we should focus on not changing anything. I we somehow screw up the timeline, the ramifications could be enormous."

"Like in 'Back to the Future!'" Sheppard offered, nodding sagely.

Rodney closed his eyes and gritted his teeth.  
How many times must I tell you that movie is quite possibly the _least_ accurate interpretation of time travel in existence?"

"But it was a good movie!" John protested.

"Oh please. A 'flux capacitor?' Hollywood isn't even _trying_ to make it sound realistic. McKay ranted. He began to pace the ZPM room. "Furthermore, if the main character changed the way his parents met, the effects would be instantaneous, not gradual. It's the Grandfather Paradox, the most basic of time travel rules! And how can they expect-"

Sheppard cut off Rodney before he picked up too much steam. "It's just a movie, McKay, for entertainment's sake only, not meant to be subject to scientific analysis."

"But how can they expect me to be entertained if they can't keep the simplest principals a time travel straight?" he cried, throwing his hands up in exasperation.

"God, I'd hate to see you watch 'Star Wars,'" the major muttered to himself.

Unfortunately, Rodney picked up on the comment. "'STAR WARS!' Arrgh, what a massacre of science! Space is a _vacuum_! There is no air in a vacuum, therefore there cannot be explosions. The Death Star would _implode_! George Lucas must have cut high school physics or something."

Finally realizing his mistake, John now tried to tip the conversation back on track. "Alright, McKay, now focus and tell me what we need to do."

"Yes, right. Well, we'll need to find some place where no one ever goes so we don't interfere in the Ancient's history. Also, if we isolate ourselves then that decreases our risk of catching the plague. Although, if the pathogen is airborne, it probably won't make much of a difference where we are," Rodney finished morbidly.

"What about the mainland?" the major suggested.

McKay fixed him with a jaundiced glare. "How do you plan on getting there, swimming? We can't fly there using a jumper because we risk changing some major battle with the Wraith."

John arched an eyebrow. "Will one jumper really make a difference? I mean the Ancient forces were pretty much wiped out by the Wraith, what's to say it wouldn't have been shot down anyway?"

"We don't know that for sure! You'd be surprised to learn what kind of things can have a major impact on history. Ever heard of the butterfly effect?"

Sheppard thought for a little. It _did _sound familiar…"That movie about that guy who blacked out and could go back in time or something? The one with that actor who all the teenage girls obsessed over?""

McKay scoffed. "Nononono, not _that_ 'Butterfly Effect!'" He stopped for a second, then began raving again. "God, that was a terrible movie. It almost rivals 'Back to the Future' in the way it horribly mangles time travel theory. But at least it-"

"Focus, McKay," the major warned.

"Of course. The _real_ butterfly effect is the essence of chaos theory. In layman's terms, a butterfly flapping its wings in North America and it alters the course of weather in Asia forever." Seeing the utterly blank, confused look on Sheppard's face, Rodney waved his hand dismissively and added, "It's much too complicated to get into now, as we do not have enough time to devote to teaching you-"

"McKay!"

"Alright! Simply put, any little thing we change could have massive repercussions. Some damage has already been done just by our being here, but we should be able to minimize our impact if we really, _really _try."

After a short pause, John concluded, "Bringing us back to my original question: so what do we do now?"

Rodney's action was purely priceless. He blinked at Sheppard a few times, then glared, and then began to bluster loudly, wildly gesturing with his hands. "I just…you are…" He clenched his fists and let out a giant, exasperated, "ARRRRRRGH! I already told you! We are going to find someplace where we won't mess up history and/or get ourselves killed!"

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Sheppard strode purposefully out of the room. McKay stared after him in pure disbelief. _I am truly surrounded by incompetence, and I will be lucky if I make it through this situation _sane_, never mind alive!_ he thought.

* * *

Well, _that_ was pointless! 


	14. Finally Some Plot Development

Chapter 14: Finally Some Plot Development

"What about that section in the southeast part of the city, 1L? We haven't explored there yet," Sheppard suggested as the two of them walked down the corridor, trying to find a suitable place to stay out of history's way.

"Just because we haven't explored it yet doesn't mean the Ancients weren't there," Rodney replied morosely. He glanced at his wrist watch. "Besides, it would take almost forty-five minutes to get there, and we have a little less time than that until we reach the point where the war with the Wraith ends- er, begins relatively speaking to us."

"Well, if we're looking for a place that was never used at all, that'll be near impossible to find. After all, it is a _city_," the major pointed out.

"Oh, very observant, major, and that is the exact problem I'm trying to solve at this very moment!" McKay snapped. Suddenly, he looked up, wide-eyed and fearful. "Did you hear something?" he asked quietly and urgently.

John paused and listened for a second. "Nope, nothing."

"I could have _sworn_ I heard…" McKay muttered, still looking around nervously. Sheppard rolled his eyes. Rodney had been jumping at his own shadow ever since they had began their search, and he had become increasingly paranoid as they got closer and closer to the Wraith War.

"If you're worried about running out of time, the city has to rise to the surface before we encounter actual Ancients and Wraith. That will give us plenty of warning," he reassured. "And I thought you said we had 45 minutes."

"Well, if you remember correctly, there is a margin of error in there because I don't have the equipment to precisely measure the-" Rodney began to gripe.

"Yes, yes, I know," the major cut Rodney off before he could repeat his complaint for the thousandth time.

"Hmmph. Anyway, we could arrive at the war any minute now, and if we're caught unawares, we might as well kiss our future selves goodbye in this reality, and in the other one created by our screw-up. So we need to find someplace to lay low and fast. And if you're not going to help, then just go…" McKay flourished his hand wildly. "..go off and…" When he couldn't come up with a decent enough thing for John to go off and do, he let his hand drop and he grumbled, "Just help."

John was starting to fervently wish he could take up on McKay's offer of swimming to the mainland. At least it was quiet there, and he would be alone without a certain snarky astrophysicist. Sulkily, he stuck his hands in his pockets. His right hand hit something small. He took it out, and smiled faintly when he saw what it was. He had completely forgotten he'd pocketed the personal shield device after tricking Rodney into punching him. Wondering whether McKay would fall for the same trick twice, he tossed the object up in the air a few times. He almost put it on when it hit him…

"McKay!" he cried suddenly.

He turned around, scowling. "What. Is. It," he hissed, accentuating each word through clenched teeth.

"Would this keep us from getting infected?" Sheppard asked urgently, holding up the shield.

Rodney let out another fair-sized scowl. "You're still carrying that thing!" he queried, sounding disgusted.

"McKay, would it?" John demanded.

Rodney paused to think for a second. "Well, it's meant mostly for physical defense, probably not on a bacterial level. But I didn't see anything in the text we found to indicate that it wouldn't protect us from infection."

"Great, let's go get another one," the major said, ready to dash off.

"Woah, woah, this isn't that simple!" McKay said quickly, holding up his hands to stop Sheppard from running away. "We still have to worry about the timeline, here! What if the shield we find would have saved the life of an Ancient who was your ancestor, for example? I mean you already could have changed something when you stole _that _one!"

John, however, was already one step ahead of the scientist. "Well, the shield imprints on the wearer, so if the timeline's what's stopping you, all we need to do is-"

"-find the one that I discovered when we first got here!" Rodney finished, nodding. "So, when I find it in the future it'll already have my energy signature and it won't matter!" He paused for a second. "Why didn't I think of that first?" he wondered aloud, as if the very _idea_ of Sheppard solving a problem before he could sickened him. When he saw the fierce glare the major had fixed him with, he said meekly, "Right, let's go."


	15. A Long Wait for a Short Result

Chapter 15: A Long Wait for a Short Result

* * *

_**Previously on "Anybody Home?"…**_

…Our heroes Rodney and John were trapped in a space-time warp that's making them go backwards in time. To avoid the Ancient Plague, they must retrieve the personal shields, use them, and get out of the way so they don't change the space-time continuum and screw over their future. Then the author suffered a horrible bout of writers' block, for which she is incredibly sorry but has no explanation for. She hopes the three people who still read the thing will forgiver her, because she has more chapters planned!

* * *

It had taken the scientist about ten minutes to remember which lab in the city he'd found the shield, and to realize that they were walking in the opposite direction of that room. It had taken a further twenty minutes to get to that lab. By this point, Sheppard was getting rather antsy about how close they were cutting it to the time when the plague hit Atlantis. McKay, however, seemed to be more concerned about other things.

Rodney picked the shield device up with his middle and forefinger as if it were some sort of dead thing and stared at it for a few seconds. He went to put it on his chest, but hesitated. Turning to Sheppard, he pleadingly asked, "Do you really think we need these? I mean, given a choice between death by plague and death by starvation, I'd much rather--"

"McKay," John growled.

"Fine," Rodney sighed. Again, he went to put it on, but again he hesitated. "Y'know, I still don't think this idea is very--"

"Mc_Kay_," Sheppard said with a frightening forced calm, "We have approximately ten minutes until we have to be completely in the clear of the city for us to get back to our own reality safely. I don't know about you, but I would rather not be caught in some sort of time paradox or something. Now, would you please _put _the damned shield_ on_."

"All _right_ then!" the scientist snapped. He placed the shield on his chest and was instantly surrounded by a green flash of light. He glared malevolently up at the major. "I hope you're happy now. If I die of starvation or dehydration because of this thing, you're the first person I'm coming back to haunt," he vowed.

"Well, if you caught the plague because you _didn't_ wear that thing, you'd come back to haunt me anyways, so I'm willing to take that chance," John shrugged.

"True," Rodney admitted reluctantly. He moodily stared at the device, then looked up at the major, and asked pointedly, "Okay, so now what?" McKay accompanied this statement with a shrug and a palpable air of irritation. When Sheppard remained silent in response to the question, he let out a low sigh, and elaborated, "So we're protected against the virus, but that still doesn't mean we're safe from changing the timeline. How do you propose we fix that, if you're the one with all the plans?"

John grinned. "Well, I've got an idea about that too…"

* * *

"You've got to be _kidding me_," McKay gaped. "The roof of the jumper bay?" He shook his head incredulously.

"Well, why not?" Sheppard shrugged. "You've been saying that we can't change anything, and that's probably the most out of the way place to be."

"When I said, 'out of the way,' I meant 'safe.' The roof of the jumper bay is most definitively 'not safe,'" Rodney snapped, making finger quotes around the appropriate phrases.

"If you're worried about the Wraith attack on Atlantis, we've got the personal shields to protect us, along with the city's shield," the major pointed out, a tad smugly. It was a rare occasion when he considered everything before McKay had, and he would not pass up the opportunity to rub it in the scientist's face.

Rodney spluttered for a second, apparently not too happy about being outsmarted by Sheppard for pretty much this entire escapade. "Shields will save us from being killed in an explosion or something, yes, but they won't save us if we fall off into the ocean!" He crossed his arms belligerently. "Besides, we would have to wait until the city rises to the surface first, and then it would be near impossible to get on the roof without being noticed."

Sheppard narrowed his eyes and pointed at McKay for emphasis. "See, now there's something that's been bugging me," he stated. "Since we're traveling backwards in time, everything is happening in reverse order that it originally happened, right?"

The scientist rolled his eyes and looked skyward at the inane question. "Yes."

"So does that mean we will actually _see_ everything _happening_ backwards?"

He scoffed. "No, it would be more like…" He proceeded to think of an appropriate analogy, but realized that the major was (again) correct, and grudgingly admitted, "Yes, I suppose so." He really would have to take control of this situation soon; Sheppard was getting too smart for his own good.

"And would they be able to see us?"

McKay graced this with yet another eye roll. Again with the insipid questions. How could someone with that little common sense be the one who was coming up with all the ideas today? "Yes, of course they would. That's the crux of the problem. Since we can interact with the environment, we can inadvertently cause a--"

"Yeah, yeah, time paradox, space-time continuum, end of the universe, all that lovely stuff," Sheppard listed sarcastically.

Rodney looked to the sky at Sheppard's response, his expression clearly reading, _Why do I even bother? _If the major already knew the answers to his own damn questions, why was he even asking them in the first place? It was a waste of precious time that they couldn't afford. "Look, I'm not going to continue this conversation, the point is that this half-baked roof idea is plain and simply _not _going to _work_."

"Just because the city is underwater doesn't mean we can't go out there. We know the shield holds until we arrive in the city some 10,000 odd years from now, so it's safe to go out there."

"Major, if we are not somewhere _very_ secluded in less than ten minutes, we have no idea how badly we could screw the future up."

"All the more reason to go _now_," the major countered lightly.

"Plans like this take _time_, Sheppard," McKay hissed, "They take time and organization, and you can't just run off and try this on a whim. We have no idea the risks--"

John flashed his most disarming smile and drawled, "I've already got it all worked out."

Rodney's rant came to a screeching halt. He cleared his throat awkwardly, and after a short pause, stated, "You do…?" in a mixture of disbelief and embarrassment.

Sheppard nodded, thoroughly enjoying the scientist's squirming.

The scientist cleared his throat again, too shocked to be angry at his defeat. "Well…I suppose…we should get going then."

John raised an eyebrow. "Yes. Let's."

* * *

A/N: Thanks to atlantean for the kick in the rear to keep writing, and (as always) to Seanait for the "Previously on…" section and for proofreading this chap to make sure I hadn't written myself into any plotholes! And to those three people who still enjoy reading and reviewing the story, you all rock! 


	16. The Fine Line Between Genius and Insane

Chapter 16: The Fine Line Between Genius and Insane

"Have I mentioned that this plan just screams of death and failure to me?"

"You have."

"Well, I still think that. Did I mention that I think this isn't going to work?"

"You did. Several times."

"Oh. Well, I feel it bears repeating."

As the pair walked down the hall, John inwardly sighed. He knew that McKay was just itching to prove him wrong. This resistance also probably had something to do with some sort of latent fear of heights that had just mysteriously manifested itself or something.

"And did I ever mention that I have this thing about falling from great heights?"

Bingo.

"Rodney," Sheppard said reasonably, "If that shield withstood me shooting you and pushing you headfirst off a balcony, then there's no reason that it wouldn't survive simply falling off the roof of the jumper bay."

"It's not the fall I'm worried about, it's the landing! In the water! I doubt this thing protects against hypothermia!" Rodney babbled.

The major rolled his eyes and deadpanned, "Well there's a simple solution to that, isn't there?"

Rodney let out a hysterical snort. "Oh, yeah, and what would that be?"

"Don't fall."

McKay stopped dead in his tracks at the response, as John continued walking. After a couple of seconds put a fifteen foot distance between the two, he came to his senses and jogged ahead, falling once again into step with Sheppard, ready to pick a new bone with him.

"Okay, just so we're clear, how exactly do you plan on _getting_ to the roof?"

"Well, there are two levels to the jumper bay, right?"

"Yes, but how does that--"

"_And_ it stands to reason that the Ancients would want some way to manually open the roof in case of mechanical failure or something, right?"

"You can't base your entire plan on the assumption that--"

"**_And_**," Sheppard emphasized to silence McKay, "There are ladders that lead from the second level up to the ceiling of the jumper bay."

Rodney began to splutter an indignant response, then scanned his memory and realized the major was right.

Recognizing the tell-tale signs of the scientist's eminent defeat, John smirked and continued, "So, all we have to do is figure out how to open the bay doors, and then we can climb onto the roof and wait it out. Piece of cake."

"Do you have any idea how many holes that plan has?" McKay scoffed, having regained his bluster.

"Do you have a better idea?" the major drawled.

Always having to have the last word, the scientist emphatically snapped, "This plan is insane."

"Yes, it is," Sheppard conceded. Then, with a sly grin, he continued, "As a matter of fact, it's _so_ insane, it just might work."

With a scowl of irritation, Rodney added, "Allow me to amend my last statement: _you're_ insane."

"Well, at least I'm in good company, aren't I?"

There was a brief silence. "Did you just call me crazy?" the scientist hissed accusingly.

John brought his hand to his mouth and coughed in an attempt to mask his laughter. "Not at all."

* * *

By McKay's estimation, they had approximately two minutes when they arrived in the jumper bay to open the roof, climb out, and close it before the city rose to the surface and the war with the Wraith started, at which point they would probably have screwed up the future to the point of the destruction of their own reality if they weren't safely away from all of this.

No pressure.

"Y'know, Rodney, it was an estimate when we had to be safely out of the way. We probably have more time than you think we do," John pointed out, not expecting the scientist to agree with him. He'd gotten used to it, though. Good thing too, or else he would be pretty bad off right about now.

"Are you willing to risk our entire future and the future of the entire city on that assumption?" Rodney returned icily. "I think not. Moreover, we could have even _less_ time than I've budgeted us, making it all the more necessary to hurry." He huffed loudly and set his jaw.

Sheppard waited a second for McKay to start to cool off, then asked, "Any idea where this manual roof-opening mechanism might be?"

The scientist clenched his jaw even tighter, the threat of him spontaneously exploding returned anew. "Look," he hissed, "This is _your _plan. You said you had it all worked out. _I _will not be the one to make this half-baked idea work. If you don't know where it is, _you_ find it."

The major shrugged. "Alright," he said, and mounted the stairs to the second level. If they were trying to find the manual controls, then the best place to look for them would be up there. Rodney grudgingly followed close behind, and the two emerged on the narrow catwalk of the second floor.

For all of McKay's griping and bitching, he certainly had a lot invested in this plan. After all, his survival depended on it as much as John's did. McKay's anger rapidly began to fade away, replaced first by concern, then by urgency.

"C'mon, c'mon," he willed, bouncing on his toes as if it was going to make the answer magically appear in front of them.

Seeing McKay's mood beginning to change again, this time to panic, Sheppard mildly suggested, "We can always just do it remotely through the jumpers."

Gritting his teeth, Rodney replied, "No, no we can't, because I'm not going to risk using up all the time we have trying to isolate the correct control pathway to open the roof."

"I though you and Zelenka already found out what control pathway it was."

"Evidently you don't know how Zelenka and I discovered the control pathway," he snapped. "It was pure dumb luck. And unlike you, I tend not to like to rely on dumb luck to save the day."

"Hey, what's that?" Sheppard asked all of a sudden, pointing at a device on the wall that looked like some sort of fuse box with clear crystals instead of circuits.

"Uh…" Rodney stared at it dumbfounded for a second. He walked up to the box and examined the crystals for a second, before turning around wide-eyed. "Those…would be the roof controls," he managed to stammer out in disbelief.

As the scientist turned back around and began to figure out how to work the controls, the major smirked. _Heh. Dumb luck_, he thought to himself.

Rodney snapped his fingers idly as he examined the control panel, and then began to gingerly shuffle the delicate crystals. Sheppard was leaning casually against the wall next to the controls, watching the proceedings but not really following. He wasn't going to point out that at least five minutes had passed since McKay's two-minute mark. The last thing they needed was for Rodney to get distracted from his oh-so-urgent work by panicking. John would make sure to mention it later, when they were safe and he could more fully take advantage of the annoyance potential.

"Hah!" McKay triumphantly proclaimed a minute or so later, as a loud metallic grinding noise rang out from overhead. The scientist turned around to watch the bay doors open. However his triumph melted into first disbelief, then panic, as they stopped, still halfway closed.

Oh dear. This was going to be interesting.

* * *

A/N: I'm going to be swamped for the next few weeks with finals coming up, so I'm getting all my updates out now. Once summer fully starts, I'm going to finish this sucker and be done with it! 


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